Month: September 2016

This video is essentially a vlog version of something I wrote for this website a few weeks ago. In that blog I talk about conventional wisdom and how it’s sometimes obviously right, but also how sometimes it’s surprisingly wrong. Because what’s generally accepted often turns out to be wrong, I try to pay attention whenever… Read more

Over the past couple of months I’ve ended all of my videos with the mantra “HAKO.” It’s an acronym I came up with a long time ago that stands for Honesty, Assertiveness, Kindness, and Open-mindedness. For the longest, it has served as a personal reminder of what I think are the baseline values a decent… Read more

I got into a debate online with this guy not too long ago because he’d shared a post about a man being arrested in Germany for performing the Nazi salute. He congratulated the government of Germany for its commitment to stamping out hatred. I argued, however, that stifling free expression was a dangerous precedent and… Read more

We all know about “mob mentality;” the idea that if you get a lot of people together in the same space, it can lead to these people being influenced to adopt certain ideas and become very hostile to opposing ideas. Sometimes mobs form organically around common frustrations or fandoms, but another (and arguably more effective)… Read more

Ever since I was a kid I’ve always considered myself a “jack of all trades, but master of none.” I get really excited to try out things so often that it’s really hard for me to focus on any one thing for too long. Also, I’ve always been a very competitive person, so I’m often… Read more

In my videos, I tend to come off as “the expert” or “the one who’s figured it out”, and that’s to be expected when you have a platform like this. Thousands of people watch my videos, presumably because they think I have valuable things to say. But of course, I’m not perfect. And the rare… Read more

A lot of people act like social issues are all black and white; that there is one “correct” side of the argument to be on and no amount of context or nuance can change that. If you know anything about me, you know that I strongly reject this way of thinking. “The only thing truly… Read more

I’m planning to do a Q&A video at least once a month, so be sure to leave me more questions to answer in the future! Also I’ve launched a t-shirt campaign with teespring.com! If you’d like an additional way to support me or to just sport some cool T1J gear, check out my store. For now,… Read more

There was a big fuss on the internet yesterday, as creators across YouTube suddenly noticed that many of their videos were being blocked from monetization by YouTube. It turns out, YouTube had updated its policy on what kinds of videos can be monetized and was quietly demonetizing videos for almost a year now. Apparently now,… Read more